Mail Call: Nerd!

       A wonderful package arrived recently and the nerd in me cannot be more excited about it for too many reasons.  One, it is a shiny non-sports insert set that is nine cards that makes up an entire picture on a page.  Two, it is from one of the late great sci-fi shows of all time, murdered before its time Firefly.


Alas, the scan does not do the shiny justice but I just love how this page looks. Firefly Forever indeed.

The backs give information on all the characters of the show.  If you have never seen it, there are 14 episodes so you can watching it in one day, basically.  I suggest finding the DVDs ASAP although Sci-Fi Channel has been known to show the whole thing in one marathon as well.


I bought these on eBay from a seller in the UK.  I rarely do that as I do not trust European mail to get over here to the New World in one piece.  Luckily, fate was on my side and it did.  I also think this is the most immaculately put together package I have ever received from anywhere.  Look at it:

The stamp, the folding, the fonts, the penmanship.  It looks like a movie prop or a clue from a computer game.  The mail nerd in me was looking at this thing for like 45 minutes to take in its beauty. This might be the dorkiest post I have ever done or may ever do, but hey, we are all nerds in our own way in this hobby, some of us just wallow in it more than others.

Gobble Gobble.

There is only one Turkey I would want to be today:
 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Trade with William of foul bunt.

       I present to you the smallest swap I have done in quite some time.  In fact, in terms of time from start to finish, this single card was very well earned.  A little background: I was clicking about the card-blogosphere a few months while ago during a bout of insomnia when I bumped into foul bunt.  Somehow this gem has been operating under my radar for some time now - I suggest it highly as it is well written and well organized.  After reading a bunch of posts, I noticed he had a trade bait tab so I clicked to peruse what he had to offer.  I saw he had a card from this year that I had wanted to add to my collection of Mets busts, a Chasing History Collin Cowgill autograph:

Collin Cowgill: Another Mets Spring Training superstar.  The only history he chased with the Mets was lowest BA.

So I emailed William and asked what he would want for it.  Turns out, he had just sent it off to COMC that week but he offered to call it back for me.  So not only is William a good writer, he is a good person too.  This gave me plenty time to put together some 2013 Topps Emerald parallels and some other Orioles goodies for him from his wantlists.  Last week, I got the email from him that the card had returned and three days later - bam! - the thing arrives with a nice little note and his very handsome business card.  I haven't just traded for a single card in quite some time as I usually like to pile on and make the most of things.  But the fact that most of my O's oddballs get sent off to Kevin means that for now this minor trade will have to do.  Because of William's politeness and willingness to go out of his way for me, though, I am quite certain this will not be our last. 

Freedom.

       As every media outlet in the universe has no doubt let you know, today is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

You will be inundated with remembrances, retrospectives, theories, and conspiracies about every aspect of this event.  As I have said before, I do not want to lament anyone's death, I would rather celebrate how they lived.  And boy, did JFK live.  Plus, what gets lost most of all in the canonization of the man and the lunatic myth-making of his death is all the actual stuff he did.  I think if you asked the average American about any of the legislation his presidency passed, most would give you a look akin to a dog being shown a card trick.

        One thing JFK actually did was set the standard for the current Presidential Medal of Freedom. This is the highest civilian award in the United States.  Earlier this week, President Obama awarded this year's recipients and one of them was Mr. Cub Ernie Banks.  He is the ninth Major League baseball player to receive this medal.  As a change of pace today, let's look at all those winners, shall we?

Ernie Banks 2013

Poor Ernie not only never got to play in the postseason, he had to receive his medal from a White Sox fan...he probably deserved better than that. 

Stan Musial 2011

Musial was in the navy in WWII (as you can see in the card in the middle first row) and you would be hard pressed to find a better ambassador for baseball than The Man. 

Buck O'Neil 2006

OK, I take that back, Buck O'Neil might be the best ambassador for baseball ever.  He played in the Negro Leagues from 1937 until basically the Negro Leagues stopped being a thing.  He then was a scout for the Cubs (and helped them sign the aforementioned Ernie Banks) and was even the first African-American coach in the majors.  But Buck O'Neil became an icon late in life thanks to Ken Burns' documentary series Baseball.  If a 20+ hour film can have a star, Buck was it.  His knowledge and enthusiasm for baseball permeate the whole project and every moment he is on the screen is a joy. 

Frank Robinson 2005

Frank Robinson is simply the most underrated baseball player of all time.  His numbers somehow get lost in the shuffle, even though they are gargantuan.  He also was the first African American manager in the majors when he took the reins of the Indians in 1975.  Plus, if you ever want to ask a tricky trivia question, hit them with "Who was the first black manager in the National League?" because the answer is also Frank Robinson.

Roberto Clemente 2003

I have covered Roberto Clemente before on this blog.  If you don't understand why Roberto would get this award, you don't understand either.

Hank Aaron 2002

For all the scrutiny today's athletes say they have to endure, did any man have to put up with more nonsense while just trying to play a game than Hank Aaron?  And given those circumstances, could he have acted more humble and classy?  I think not.  America owes a huge apology to Hank Aaron and I like to think this award was part of that.

Ted Williams 1991

I snarkily celebrated Teddy Ballgame recently but really, to be honest, there is no way to overstate Williams' credentials as an American Badass: Maybe the greatest hitter of all time.  Maybe the greatest fly fisherman of all time.  Flew combat missions in two different wars.  Used his Hall of Fame speech as a call to have Negro League players enshrined.  I mean, John Wayne based his voice and cadence after him for crying out loud.  What is more American than that?

Jackie Robinson 1984

That it took until 1984 to give Jackie Robinson this honor is kind of outrageous, don't you think?  Shouldn't he have been on the short list, like, the very first year? 

Joe DiMaggio 1977

It proves that people were always kinda overestimating the value of Joe DiMaggio as he was the first baseball player to receive the Medal of Freedom.  That said, you have to remember that sometimes the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.  Dividing The Myth, The Man, and The Player out of Joe D is almost impossible, so you kinda just have to go with it - and it seems history and pop culture always have when it comes to him.  Plus, you gotta figure since he was married to Marilyn Monroe for a short time, he and JFK had a lot more in common than we'd all care to think about. 

Football '13 Week 12: Throwback Thursday.

       While I am hardly a bandwagon jumper when it comes to the Saints, I have to admit, I have not suffered nearly as much as longtime fans have.  I got into the game just as the team has hit its stride as a perennial contender.  After all, this is a team that took 20 years just to make the playoffs and more than 30 years to actually win a playoff game.  I am spoiled in retrospect. 

At 8-2, the Saints are in the driver's seat to win the division and with a few breaks, they could be the number one seed in the conference.  That last point is critical as teams have a habit of coming into the Superdome and getting thoroughly destroyed. At the beginning of the year, The Falcons looked like a huge obstacle in all this.  Instead, they are a minor speed bump.  Hopefully, they will not play spoiler and just lay down at home as they have to seemingly every other team this year. 

Seeing as this game is on Thursday night, I figured it would be a good time to do a little Throwback special for the Saints.  Since I have covered the actual design of these cards before, lets instead look at the players and overall teams for the Saints from back before they could even dream of finishing above .500.

1987 Saints: 12-3.

Well, okay, this was the first glimmer of hope.  This was the first season the Saints finished above .500 and also the first they made the playoffs.  They lost that first playoff game to the Vikings 44-10.  In fact, they lost their first 4 playoff games by a cumulative score of 123-56.

1986 Saints: 7-9.

You will notice as we go through these pages that the kicker and punter always seem to be prominently represented for the Saints.  In sets where they were only making 10-12 cards per team, this is not the sign of a quality team. 

1982 Saints: 4-5.

During a strike year, the Saints won 4 games.  This was more games than they had won in 6 of their first 13 seasons.  Oh, and remember that punter/kicker observation from before?  The Saints once drafted a punter in the first round.  That man was Russell Erxleben.  Now, as crazy as this notion seems when your team is terrible, you would think if you are going to use/waste your first draft pick on a punter, he would be one hell of a punter, right?  Well, of course he flamed out in about six years.  He even eventually spent time in federal prison.  And weirdest of all, this is not the worst thing the Saints ever did during the draft.  Aren't those black and gold uniforms handsome, though?

1981 Saints: 4-12.

Looking at the faces of the players on these cards, you would think they had spent time in 'nam recently rather than playing professional football.  Only the kicker is kind of almost breaking a smile, and that's only compared to the other faces on this page.  This was a year after The Aints and their 1-15 season so this team was comparatively a great improvement.  Yikes.

1979 Saints: 8-8.

Between 1967 and 1986, this record was the high water mark.  Actually, when speaking of New Orleans, maybe that is the wrong turn of phrase.  All praise Chuck Muncie: Original Hipster.  The man had a look.

1978 Saints: 7-9.

Seven wins was as many wins as they had in the two previous seasons combined.  Archie Manning deserved better than the teams he was saddled with in the 70's.  As it is, he has the lowest winning percentage of any QB in history.  I guess he got his revenge through his bloodline by unleashing Eli and Peyton on the world two decades later.

1974 Saints: 5-9.

You gotta love the poses on these cards.  Everyone looks like they walked right off the set of The Longest Yard or North Dallas Forty.  Bob Pollard not only looks like a serious serious man, he has the same name as the lead singer of my favorite band ever not named The Beatles.

My complete pages of team years ends there.  From there, it is all 3x3.  This might be for the best as the records are more of the same: 1975 2-12, 1973 5-9, 1971 4-8-2.  At least they only played 14 games back then.

Happy Feller?  Seriously? 

1972 2-11-1, 1970 2-11-1, 1969 5-9. 

Dan Abramowitz sounds and looks like he should be your accountant and not a pro football player.  Instead, he was one of the best players of the early Saints.  And I gotta say, the late 60's and early 70's posed pictures are 100x better than the candid sideline photos of players without their helmets on from the late 70's and early 80's.  Such jaunty angles and variety.  Scroll back up to those 1981 cards again and these.  It looks like it's not even the same sport.

Mail Call: Oddest of the Odd.

       I have not chronicled my new found love of Listia as much as I think I should here on this blog.  I certainly have shown my love for oddball cards and dime boxes at card shows.  Listia allows me to indulge these two loves at the same time without even having to leave my house.  I mean, sure, I try and secure quality cards from Listia, but my real favorite thing is to find weird lots of cards and buy them.  Last week, I bid on what I thought was three pretty crazy cards.  Instead, the seller put some unexpected bonuses into the envelope and may very well have created the freakiest lot I have ever seen:

The original lot was the Strawberry, the Whitney Houston(!) and the Superman hologram.  I am not entirely certain how I even ran across this lot; I must have searched "strawberry" I suppose.  As I have shown in the past I love those 1990 Starline cards (and I don't have the individual Stawberry), I adore shiny (and Superman), and say what you will about Ms Houston, but that rendition of the Star Spangled Banner is top drawer.  So I figured, what the hell, the expense was minimal.  In and of itself, though, that odd threesome probably would not have warranted its own post.  It seems the Listia gods were looking down upon me and struck hard.  The seller threw in the other six cards you see there with no warning or provocation.  And what a wonderful six cards they are.  First of all, how did they have the prescience to know I collected Frank Thomas, much less include a card I did not own.  Then there is the marvelous Brooks Robinson K-Mart oddball card, also a card I did not own.  I covered goofy fun NFL names yesterday and Dana Stubblefield definitely fits that mold.  And while basketball cards are not my favorite, an über 90's looking Phil Jackson, a so-lame-it-is-wonderful Amar'e Stoudemire rookie, and a Tim Hardaway NBA Hoops rookie is a triumvirate I can get behind. 

Thank you rosemaryforsythe, I will never forget you.  This group is so ugly, so disparate, so random it's wonderful.  I almost want to leave them as a single page but alas, this is the one time they will all be together for posterity.  Drink it in. 

Football '13 Week 11: Lyrical.

       Many of you have noticed my fascination with words and names.  While some are just amusing in and of themselves, others are simply lots of fun to say.  I love to go to a Mexican joint and order chimichangas.  I will say it two or three times.  Chim-eee-chan-gaaaaa.  I am saying it now as I type and giggling.  Plus there is also words like serendipity.  Rigamarole.  Hootenanny.  Phantasmagoria. Blubber.  So so many.

The Giants in recent years have had more than their fair share of fun names to say.  I lamented the loss of Osi Umenyiora from their defensive line because he and this man made up one hell of a good sentence:

Mathias Kiawanuka.  Key-a-wa-nuuuu-kaaaa.  So much fun to say.

And don't sleep on Prince Amukamara.  I really hope they somehow team up for a sack today just to hear the broadcasters announce that one.

I have a friend who is a huge Steelers fan and she just loves to yell Pa-la-ma-looooooooo whenever they play.  I gotta admit, I like Troy just for that reason.

Anyone else have a favorite player just because their name is fun to say?  Doesn't matter what the sport is...Buddy Biancalana and Fernando Valenzuela come immediately to mind...Shaquille O'Neal...and of course, Zarley Zalapski.  Let me know in the comments.

Award Winners '13.

       For the first time in a long while, I agree with all four choices for the major two awards.  It seems once a year for the last few years, there has a been a WHAAAAA?!?!? selection (Buster Posey over Ryan Braun?  Ryan Braun over Matt Kemp?  Josh Hamilton over Miguel Cabrera or Robinson Cano?). 

Miguel Cabrera, 2013 AL MVP.

This makes back to back MVPs for Miggy.  By my count, he should have four.

Andrew McCutchen, 2013 NL MVP.

I just heard a St. Louis writer on MLB Network trying to justify his vote for Yadier Molina and then going on to say he is not a homer.  I don't think you understand the meaning of that word if you don't think that applies to you.

Max Scherzer, 2013 AL Cy Young.

I originally collected this dude because of his very tasteful name, now look! I have a page of a Cy Young award winner.

Clayton Kershaw.  2013 NL Cy Young.

I need to work on my page of this guy.  Maybe you can help?

Oh and these are the Rookie of the Year winners.

I obviously don't have pages of these guys because, you know, rookies.

Football '13 Week 10: Veteran's Day.

       Today is Veteran's Day.  If you have any friends or family that served in the military, please thank them for their service today.  Heck, even if you see someone on the street, shake their hand and offer thanks.

Except for one glaring exception, you don't hear much about professional athletes who served in the military.  This is a blessing and a curse, I suppose, since without the draft they can focus on their sport and not Uncle Sam. 

If you watched any football this weekend, they had moments for our military at all the stadiums.  Of all the mistakes and horrors that came out of the Vietnam war, one of the worst was how we treated the men and women who returned from that conflict.  Luckily, we somehow learned a lesson from that and while we still participate in fruitless wars, we try and show our appreciation to our service members who return.

So as you settle in to watch a god awful Monday Night Football game this evening, keep in mind all those around who protected your freedom to be incensed at ESPN.

Just Because.

Keith Hernandez is the only one mentioned in this graphic three times, a minor upset.  I've always felt Rollie Fingers had the definitive mustache in the 20th century.  What do you think?

Football '13 Week 9: Party Crashers.

       I am currently sitting at home in my pajamas on my couch about to watch the Saints and Jets play.  Pretty nice, right?  Well, my mother is currently at the Meadowlands in a suite about to watch the game.  That bitch.  Anyway, I had this game circled early in the year as the most possible Annual Saints Total Ass Whupping. Instead, the Jets are 4-4 and actually look like a professional football team.  Funny how these things work out sometime.  I still anticipate a Saints win, but it won't be the automatic walkover I was imagining. 

The only Jets cards I own are a page of Joe Namath cards that I have featured before, so let's instead look at some shiny 90's oddballs that kind of represent the Jets this year:

Ah, you gotta love Upper Deck Collector's Choice and their wonderful convoluted contests.  I never quite understood the criteria for how you won these cards, which is just as well.  I picked these up in a dime box ages ago, which is much easier.

You gotta love how 90's looking these are; so much foil, so many bright colors, so much full bleed and odd backgrounds. 

Anyway, I look forward to a wonderful quiet day at home watching football and I pray my mother doesn't get punched or sexually harassed by irate Jets fans after their loss.

I Love It When You Call Me Big Papi.

       David Ortiz.  2013 World Series MVP.

David Ortiz went 11 for 16 (.688) with two home runs and six RBIs.  They walked him three times intentionally in game six alone because he was so blazing hot.  David Ortiz reached base more times in a six-game World Series than any other player in history, breaking the mark previously held by Paul Molitor for the Blue Jays in 1993.

David Ortiz.  Scrap heap free agent signing in 2003.

David Ortiz.  Three Time World Series Champion and future Hall of Famer.

David Ortiz.  Team leader and Boston legend. 

What a lovely day for a parade. Cue the duckboats.